Anonymous: Unmasking the Internet's Most Powerful Collective

by Gregg Housh

Every generation has a movement. In the 1960s people boycotted segregated busses, today a few people can take down entire companies from the comfort of their own living rooms—in 2011, social media users and self-dubbed "hacker-activists" from across the globe have come together to form the movement of the digital Anonymous. One man, Gregg Housh, who has his own sordid past as a criminal hacker and software pirate, tells the story of the rise of this controversial entity.Government agencies have described the Anonymous hacking group as "a loose and nebulous confederation of Internet users. Anonymous features no distinct or recognized organization or leadership, operating instead by the momentum of Internet populism. Perhaps the only commonality among people affiliated with Anonymous is a militant, fundamentalist view on the freedom of information, censorship, and corruption, especially with respect to governments or organizations leveraging governments." Anonymous has struck blows against foreign governments (Egypt, Libya, Tunisia), corporations (Sony, Visa, MasterCard) and governmental agencies (FBI, CIA, NATO) in the collective's ongoing campaign against injustice.Anonymous, the book, will not only reveal the inner workings of one of the most mysterious groups—the people who have been behind movements such as the Scientology takedown in 2008, the protests in Tunisia this past spring, and Occupy Wall Street—but it will also take you inside the mind of Gregg Housh—a fascinating character who grew up in poverty, raised by a single mother and abandoned by a drug-dealing father. From a young age, Housh was an autodidact and a computer prodigy. And like Julian Assange or Mark Zuckerberg, he will go down in the history books as one of the most influential figures of the social media era.

272 pages, Hardcover

First published July 23, 2013